Red Like Fruit is a play unlike any play you’ve likely seen. It’s uncomfortable, that’s the point – sexual assault is anything but comfortable and here Lauren (Michelle Monteith) is trying to carefully recall her years of sexual abuse from different people in her life but unsure of the credibility of her own memory. She asks Luke (David Patrick Flemming) to tell her story for her. But…why did she ask him?
Red Like Fruit by 2b theatre company is written by Hannah Moscovitch and directed by Christian Barry, presented by Soulpepper Theatre and Luminato Festival. In this 80-minute candid conversation, we learn about Lauren through the voice of Luke. Lauren is a journalist working on a scandalous political piece involving the abusive indiscretions of a certain high powered politician. As she delves into the lives of the parties involved, she is brought back to her own traumatic past, one that she suppressed and pushed away, or at least tried to.
As an audience, as people, we are accustomed to keeping our eyes trained on the person speaking. In this case, remind yourself to keep your eyes on Lauren while Luke speaks. She sits atop a platform and her reactions, her recoils, reflect Luke’s recital of her words. Luke delivers her story with a combination of disbelief and near disdain for the multiple accounts of sexual violence that make up her past.
There is much of Lauren’s story that sounds plausible enough to be true and you’re left wondering if any of it actually happened. You’re also left wondering why Luke is there, why is he giving voice to Lauren’s past? There is much to say about how women, especially women who have lived through repeated abuse and gaslighting, often find themselves questioning their own memory.
Red Like Fruit can be very triggering for some and yet it also includes moments of humor as a way of dulling the blow from the otherwise tragic retelling. It is raw and painful and yet eye-opening at the same time. If the trigger warnings won’t affect you, it is also worth seeing.
Photo Credit: Riley Smith
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